


An Addict's Mentality

by afteriwake



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-12
Updated: 2013-03-12
Packaged: 2017-12-05 03:20:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/718278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/afteriwake/pseuds/afteriwake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock knew he was an addict, and that most of the time an addict would substitute one addiction for another. He had replaced drugs with nicotine patches, case solving and adrenaline, and then John had come along and he'd gotten a new addiction to John. But now that he needed to save John's life, could he sever that addiction as well?</p>
            </blockquote>





	An Addict's Mentality

**Author's Note:**

> An answer to a sherlockmas prompt ("Sherlock has replaced his drugs addiction with a John-addiction. This could be sexual or not, light or dark, author's choice."). I used to be the live-in manager of a woman's recovery home, so a lot of the stuff I wrote about here is influenced by the conversations I had with the women there.

He was an addict. At the core of his being, he knew this. After all, the adage was once an addict, always an addict. You might conquer the actual addiction, but the cravings would never quite leave. The personality would never completely change. Sometimes you managed to drop it all, but most of the time you substituted one addiction for another. He knew this well. His drug of choice had been heroin. Oh, he dabbled in other drugs, but heroin gave him the best high, made him think more clearly, focus better. The first time he had shot up had been the best time, and no high after that had matched up. He was always hunting the next fix, and in the darkest days of his addiction he did many things he would regret when he had to sit down and look at them with the cold light of sobriety splashed on his past.

He hated to admit it, but rehab had probably been the best thing for him. Oh, he’d fought it tooth and nail when his brother had him sent there the first time, and he’d promptly relapsed upon release. It was maybe a few months later that he’d overestimated, shot himself with too much, and if it hadn’t been for strangers he’d have been dead. The second time he went to rehab he had hit rock bottom, and the second time stuck. It wasn’t an easy process, but it had worked.

He hadn’t given up everything. He still dabbled with some of the conscious altering drugs, like LSD and ecstasy, but never too much and never to the point it hurt him. He had been a smoker while he was an addict, and after rehab he kicked the smoking habit but replaced it with an overabundance of nicotine patches. He knew he was an addict at his core, and if it wasn’t one addiction it was another: caffeine, adrenaline, mentally challenging cases. If he’d been the type to enjoy sex he may have added that to his repertoire of post-rehab addictions, but that was one area of his life that he looked at with distaste after some of the things he had done to fuel his addictions. It had left a bad taste in his mouth and the less he thought about those urges the better.

He’d managed well enough, handling what few addictions and indulgences he had without raising the ire of his brother or the concern of his mother. And then John Watson had come along. He hadn’t really realized what this one man was going to do to his life when he first met him. In fact, he’d been absolutely sure John would turn around and run, get away from Sherlock and his messes when Lestrade had raided the flat for the drugs bust. But John had stayed. John had actually killed a man to protect him. And before Sherlock knew it, he had a new addiction: John.

He didn’t want John out of his sight. Logically he knew John had to have a life of his own. He knew that without time away he would grow to hate him and then he would lose John. But he didn’t care. He was an addict, and addicts are greedy. They only care about themselves, about getting their next fix. Friends, family and careers fall to the wayside in the hunt for the next fix, and when you’re addicted to a particular person you want all of their time, all of their energy. You want them however you can get them, and soon it becomes not enough. You want them all the time, every waking minute. And you don’t care what they themselves want.

Addiction is a tricky business, he knew that, and an addiction to a person was so much harder to kick than an addiction to a drug. But the one silver lining to being addicted to a person’s company is that, sometimes, that person can change the addict. Not always for the better; sometimes it goes into full blown stalking and the possessive behavior escalates, but sometimes it can be for the better. John had changed him for the better, he knew. John’s own addiction to the rush he felt when he was working a case made him stay despite how horridly he was treated at times. He knew that if John had to say it out loud, John might have his own addiction to him, if he could bear to admit it.

There was never a sexual element to their relationship of mutual addiction. The partnership grew into a real, true friendship, and as he saw the changes John was making in him he realized he would do anything to keep this man safe, even if it meant letting him go, even if it meant making him think he was dead. The hardest part of an addiction is breaking the cycle of your dependence. He’d managed to kick heroin, and over the time he’d known John he’d managed to kick all the other drugs and things he thought enhanced his life but only made it worse. But now it was time to end the biggest addiction, and he wasn’t sure he could do it. Standing on the roof, his phone to his ear, John on the other end of the call…that was the hardest thing he’d ever done. The fall and the sudden stop at the end were of no moment; the hardest part of it all was pretending to be dead when he could hear John scant inches away, needing to see him, needing to know, needing to try and save him. He severed two addictions that day, and now, as he stands watching his friend salute an empty grave and make promises to the person he believes to be in it, he knows the real test is coming. Can he walk away from this addiction as well without falling back on old habits, or is this rock bottom going to be the end of him? Only time can tell, and he hoped that it works out well for both of them in the long run.


End file.
